Jerry Royster, Quintana Roo Manager

Editor’s Note: As part of a series of posts about the 2015 Liga Mexicana de Beisbol, here is our look at the first of the managers of the 16 Mexican baseball teams. Following that, the standings of the Mexican baseball teams as of the beginning of this week.

Jerry Royster of the Tigres de Quintana Roo

Jerry Royster was born in Sacramento, CA in 1952. He was drafted by the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1970 and started his first major league game in August of 1973, playing third base. He had a career that spanned 15 years in which he played for five different big league teams. Jerry compiled a .249 batting average while hitting 40 home, driving in 352 and stealing 189 bases. During his career, he also played for the Chicago White Sox, the San Diego Padres and the New York Yankees. He ended his playing career playing third base with the Atlanta Braves in 1988. In 1976, he was named to the 1976 Topps All-Star Rookie Roster.

His coaching career began in 1993 as a third base coach for the Colorado Rockies, a gig that only lasted one year. Jerry was out of baseball until 2000 when, as a bench coach for Davey Lopes of the Milwaukee Brewers, he was named interim manager after Lopes got off to a disastrous start. Although the interim tag was removed 2 weeks later, Royster was fired at the end of the year following a 53-94 record.

Before being named manager of the Dodgers Triple A affiliate, the Las Vegas 51′s, in 2005, Royster had been the Dodgers infield coordinator for the 2003 and 2004 seasons.

In 2007, Royster was signed as manager of the Lotte Giants of the South Korean Baseball League in Busan, South Korea. He became the first non-Korean to manage in the league and he managed the Giants until 2010.

﻿The Tigres de Quintana Roo hired Royster as their manager in 2014 where he led the team to a 65-48 record and 1st place in the Sur Division of the Liga Mexicana de Beisbol. The Tigres lost to the Pericos de Puebla in the semi-final round of the divisional playoffs last year, so you can bet he is hoping to bring back his winning team in 2015.